Icy Box IB-MP301 HDD Media Player

Introduction & Specifications

With video formats such as MPEG4, DIVX and SVCD being the 'norm' for content downloaded from the internet, it is becoming increasingly difficult to simply watch your downloads on an ordinary Television. Most users opt for using conversion software to turn these exotic compressed formats into something can be written to CD or DVD and read directly by their DVD player. However, converting full length movies can be extremely time consuming and wasteful of blank media if you simply want to watch the downloaded item only once.

Many users have gone to the extreme of setting up an entire 'HTPC' setup purely for watching downloaded media. This is often very expensive as components for a whole computer system are required along with a HTPC friendly Operating System. However, German manufacturer Raidsonic may well have come up with the answer in their recently released Icy Box IB-MP301 External Media Player. Capable of reading formats such as SVCD, MPEG4, DVD, VCD, DIVX and MP3 from the internal 3.5" IDE hard disk (not included) and using its own proprietary operating system, the IB-MP301 seems to combine everything needed to take the pain out of watching your movies on the big screen.

Specifications

The following information has been taken directly from Raidsonic's website located here.

With support for over 15 different file formats including images and audio as well as video, the Icy Box IB-MP301 is certainly well equipped for any files downloaded from the internet that you might want to throw on it.

Great read m8. All through the descriptions I kept stopping and thinking "hmm ageing tech.." - then getting to the end and seeing the price tag, it`s pretty decent.

I couldn`t see myself buying it to house my DVD collection, as frankly it wouldn`t fit (limiting to 500g), but I could however see myself filling it with all music, photos/pictures and maybe music videos. Even tho that`d probably only take perhaps a safe 200g.

I couldn`t see myself buying it to house my DVD collection, as frankly it wouldn`t fit (limiting to 500g), but I could however see myself filling it with all music, photos/pictures and maybe music videos. Even tho that`d probably only take perhaps a safe 200g.

Yeah agreed. In all honesty I can see it appealing more to people who download things like episodes of Lost, 24, Simpsons etc off the net (note: I don't condone this!) and just want to be able to watch it on a big screen without faffing around burning it to disks.

Good review Jim, this is comething that i would be interested in. As you pointed out, if you could put for example freeview through the box and record off it, then this would be a must buy. I was surprised that the lack of s-video out, as all 3 of my t.v.'s have s-video in's

hi i just bought an icy box and fitted a 500gb Seagate Barracuda IDE 16mb drive. When i hook the MP301 upto my pc, it doesn't detect it and the player displays "read" on its display and doesn't change. I know i have to format the drive in FAT32, but do i have to do this before i fit it into the player or can i do it through the usb at a later stage? I know it's probably somethin obvious I'm doing wrong. Any help would be much appeciated

I have the MP301 with a 500Gb drive partitioned as primary and formatted as FAT32.

Mine registers a maximum of 1,200 files at about 15% done and stops counting even though it continues to scan up to 100%. 3000 would be a luxury!

The current format was done with h2format.exe although I previously tried the same with swissknife.

I thought I could live with the 1,200 limit if I could get it to see the 1,200 I actually want to play. It seems to have read the folders in reverse order so I copied around 1,200 files to a folder called XMedia, so it was clearly the last folder. The MP301 just ignores it.

I've tried moving XMedia to various locations. I've tried different format tools and re-copying the files. It only ever sees the original 1,200 files. If I delete those leaving only XMedia, it sees nothing!

How can I get it to forget the first 1,200 it saw and scan again?

Better still, how can I get it to see the 10,000 files I actually have?

This seems really good and cheap alternative to HTPC's. I am however only insterested as using it as sound server sort of.

Can someone tell me whether you can set this to randomly play all the MP3 files on the hard drive, or do you have to pick out certain tracks, using the remote. Can you also use this is without a screen? Can you pick out certain tracks to play or what?

Does anyone know whether remote is IR or is it wireless? The reason I ask is that I have Russound multi-room sound system in the house, which gives you six different inputs which are controlled by IR repeaters. I could set up two of these identically and have different music playing in various rooms.

Hi! I have the same problem... It just recognizes 1.200 files of more than 30.000 I stored... Any ideas on how to solve this? Is there something we can do on this?

Quote:

Originally Posted by name='carlt'

I have the MP301 with a 500Gb drive partitioned as primary and formatted as FAT32.

Mine registers a maximum of 1,200 files at about 15% done and stops counting even though it continues to scan up to 100%. 3000 would be a luxury!

The current format was done with h2format.exe although I previously tried the same with swissknife.

I thought I could live with the 1,200 limit if I could get it to see the 1,200 I actually want to play. It seems to have read the folders in reverse order so I copied around 1,200 files to a folder called XMedia, so it was clearly the last folder. The MP301 just ignores it.

I've tried moving XMedia to various locations. I've tried different format tools and re-copying the files. It only ever sees the original 1,200 files. If I delete those leaving only XMedia, it sees nothing!

How can I get it to forget the first 1,200 it saw and scan again?

Better still, how can I get it to see the 10,000 files I actually have?

Hi, could you comment on the User Interface? Is it difficult to navigate? Also, is the fan loud or quiet?

Thanks.

Also i am curious to know how the firmware upgrade is performed?

The user interface is somewhat clunky. Worst part is that it is based on something like the old 8.3 file name limits so it displays about the first 6 characters of the filename followed by a number to keep them unique. Very difficult to see which file is which when they're called something like Friend_7.

It's a bit tricky to to navigate between videos, music and photos.

It can't get it to play music while browsing photos.

I can't see a random play function for photos and music.

The remote is very directional so I have to set directly in front of the box and point directly at it.

The fan isn't too loud but it seems to have a high pitched whine bordering on a squeal. The TV sound normally covers it.

The disk and fan don't seem to spin down on standby so I switch it off at the front panel.

I still have the 1200 files limit and am waiting for RaidSonic to develop new firmware. Not sure if that actually means there is some in the pipeline and whether it's a known fault which will definitely be fixed. It could be just a stock response.

Hi! I have the same problem... It just recognizes 1.200 files of more than 30.000 I stored... Any ideas on how to solve this? Is there something we can do on this?

My vendor gave me the choice of returning it or waiting for RaidSonic. I opted for the latter but many weeks have passed. If you have an option to return it and know a good alternative then I'd recommend you do that.

I've mailed Raidsonic to ask where my new firmware is. If I get a reply I'll post it.

There is no mention of a firmware update method in the manual. The sales blurb does say it is upgradeable. It's not stored on the HDD. I expect there's some kind of hidden maintenance mode to allow it to be sent over USB. I expect I'll find out if and when the firmware comes.

If u remove the 1200 it found out of the 30000, does it recognize 1200 different ones ?

I tried some experiments along these lines.

It seems to somehow remember the original first 1200 files it saw, even between formats. Once it has those 1200 registered it won't see anything new. It has some kind of memory. Removing the 1200 meant that it saw nothing.

I created a folder called zMedia. That placed it last alphabetically but meant the box scanned it first. I copied the 1200 items I most wanted to see into there. It didn't see them, just the old 1200. I tried various things including reformats, front panel resets and factory resets from the menu. Then I gave up, switched off and left it a few days.

Strangely enough the next time I tried it, it picked up the 1200 in zMedia, so I now have access to some files I actually want to see. Perhaps leaving it alone helped it forget it's memory of the initial 1200 files?

I now have new ones to add so I'm hoping I can get it to do the same again somehow...

Strangely enough the next time I tried it, it picked up the 1200 in zMedia, so I now have access to some files I actually want to see. Perhaps leaving it alone helped it forget it's memory of the initial 1200 files?

You said "some files". It means that you couldn't access to all the new 1200?

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